AI is developing at a rapid rate.
It's already making headlines for its capabilities in predicting health conditions and even more worringly, when we will die.
Now, medical researchers are claiming that their new AI algorithm can identify health issues with just the colour of your tongue.
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Yep, that taste-tingling organ in your mouth can be a marker of health status.
What's interesting is that this novel system is based on the ancient medical practice of tongue diagnosis but with the modern twist of machine learning (ML).
Main author Ali Al-Naji, an adjunct professor at Baghdad's Middle Technical University and at the University of South Australia, said he drew inspiration from traditional Chinese medicine, which has long used tongue analysis to diagnose health issues.
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'The colour, shape, and thickness of the tongue can reveal a litany of health conditions,' Al-Naji said.
Javaan Chahl, a co-author of the study highlighted that not only is this 'computerised tongue analysis' safe and effective, but it also 'backs up modern methods with a centuries-old practice.'
Teaching hospitals in the Middle East provided 60 tongue photos from patients with various conditions, from gastrointestinal problems to COVID-19. The AI managed to pinpoint the condition with over 98% accuracy, all based on tongue colour.
The system was trained with more than 5,200 tongue images with their associated diagnoses, separating it into six separate ML algorithms.
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The team tested whether it could 'predict tongue colour under any lighting condition,' as the study, published in the journal Technologies, noted.
What's more is that the least accurate of these systems, the naïve Bayes methodology, still achieved more than 91% rate of accuracy, while the open-source XGBoost framework nailed it with a closely followed 98.71% success rate.
The study was affiliated with universities in Baghdad and Australia and drew on current medical data.
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A yellow tongue might signal diabetes whilst a purple-coated tongue could be a sign of cancer, and an oddly shaped red tongue might suggest individuals with acute stroke.
'A white tongue can indicate anaemia; people with severe cases of COVID-19 are likely to have a deep-red tongue.' Al-Naji told the New York Post. 'An indigo- or violet-coloured tongue indicates vascular and gastrointestinal issues or asthma.'
The researchers are now working on a smartphone app so people can receive these predictive diagnostics from the comfort of their homes.